Sucky news, lets hope things pick up.

Buy! Buy! Buy!

 

I know all the lines that I collect from Hasbro suffered again with distribution and availability. I stopped buying Star Wars, couldn't find it and the Clone Wars line was pretty much ignored. Marvel Legends suffered because of the same thing. I dont relish in the fact that they are failing because as a fan, I remember the dark times when there were no transformers on the ailses.

 

Yeah. This is why I don't (usually) comment on threads like this one. I don't have nearly enough knowledge and what I'm sure is an over abundance of bias to make a fair assessment of the situation.

 

FWIW, I know here in NZ that ROTF outsold the TF1 movie line, though by only a slim margin. Both lines were very popular and successful. DOTM tanked quite early on.


What a lot of people here are forgetting, is that Hasbro still made a pretty tidy profit in this quarter, it's just that the profit made wasn't as high as was forecast/anticipated. While it's disappointing to see that the company is sacking a number of staff, this is a normal business practise and ultimately may be a good thing for them, as they streamline, merge departments etc. Building a more unified/streamlined company can lead to better quality product being produced.

And as noted, with the significant and rapid changes in play-patterns of kids, Hasbro would be stupid NOT to try branch out brands like Transformers into other play-patterns. If there's money to be made in making lego/bionicle type figures, then it's plain business sense to target that market. Whether it works or not, we'll see.

But yes, lets all quickly blame Hasbro's financial woes on MP-10 not having massive distribution, Beast Hunters toys being all icky and gross, and the quality of FoC figures being more insulting to fans than a funeral being picketed by the WBC. Coz TF's are the only thing that Hasbro makes. Ever.

 

With the popularity, they'd be better off with My Little Pony the movie. For properties that would make a good movie. M.A.S.K anyone. Transforming vehicles and people in super suits. It tailor made for the transformers crowd. Heck the accelerator suits from the first Joe movie would make more sense for mask than joe.

Don't they own C.o.ps? another genre perfect for a movie.

Heck even Jem would make better movie than hungry hungy hippos.

 

I love this!  

 

Indeed. I REALLY want to know how much of this is due to the Hub - which, from my own limited knowledge base, seems like a smart long-term move that was inevitably going to bleed money for the short term.

Let's face it - Hasbro probably wants to make sure they have their own IP secure enough such that they can stand on their own two feet in 5 years. It's potentially dangerous for them to be so reliant on Star Wars/Marvel at this stage, given Disney owns both parent companies now.

Looking at what they've been doing, it strikes me their overall strategy of growing their own IPs is more important then ever in the long term, even if it means some short term losses.

Again though, this is my own opinion and I clearly don't know the full picture. But if I was at Hasbro I'd be very concerned that two of my company's big sellers are owned by the same media company that has a historical relationship with my biggest competitor. Those contracts don't expire for awhile, but after that who knows?

 

I can't say I am suprised by this. With the way Hasbro's decisions have been turning out it only make since that people are being laid off. I think Hasbro needs to take a look at the products are selling. Despite what has been said, I really think that collectors are the primary buyers for Hasbro merchandise. Let's be honest, kids really don't have the kind of money to get the things they want like collectors can. The only way kids mainly get stuff is asking their parents to get it for them, which probably won't be all the time.

So I think Hasbro's marketing manager or whoever should really do some thinking and find a way to make both audiences happy. Figures such as Leader Starscream a great example of this.

So please Hasbro reconsider your methods and you will make more. The people are what you need to stay in business.

 

White knighting? Really?

 

But what have they done to market Friendship is Magic specifically? How long did they piddle around with random junk before deciding to market anything related to that show's popularity? It's not like this Brony thing just suddenly appeared yesterday; they've had ample time to do something to capitalize on it.

Also, is anyone at Hasbro concerned that Takara is releasing high-quality TransFormers a full _year_ ahead of them, bleeding off sales all the while, and then, if it even gets considered for release here, Toys R Us totally bungles it by underordering and/or misdistributing?

Oh, and this:

 

Poor workers i feel for them

 

You don't have to be an insider to know some of the basic facts: releasing the same handful of Transformers movie characters over & over & over again throughout the course of 6-7 years is probably not going to do many favors. Re-re-re-re-releasing the same Star Wars characters over & over & over again just with new backgrounds on the packaging is probably not going to do many favors. Releasing a bunch of stuff with limited and/or shoddy distribution (GI Joe, Transformers, Marvel, even Star Wars) is probably not going to do many favors. Starting a television network with arguable quality and limited viewers is probably not going to do many favors. Making a deal with Hollywood to turn an old board game into a Michael Bay wannabe action flick is probably not going to do many favors. And of course downsizing yet hiking prices on figures with rampant QC issues and minimal paint is probably not going to do many favors either.

But even with all that - and not even counting the tons of other franchises that Hasbro are in control of - they still made 1.28 Billion Dollars... just in 3 months. They're hardly "in trouble". All they're doing is what EVERY giant corporation does: see a loss, promptly panic because stock & share holders are bitching, and fire people to offset more costly bad decisions still to come. Corporate 101.

 

Every company is facing similar types of declines. The economy sucks ass. What, did people think it was going to get better magically on its own? Elections and, by consequence, certain terrible economic policies, MATTER. To solely blame it on Hasbro's diminishing quality of its figures is irrational.

 

Release Prime Breakdown and Jet vehicon stateside, blindbag some arms microns, BOOM Profit, and the company is saved

(assuming Hasbro could even get them to market considering their shitty distribution)

 

thread about people losing their jobs and our first post is moaning about toy standards and plastic quality. Stay classy.

Yeah, that's how it looked to me. It's pretty funny. On the one hand I don't seriously expect people with that much power to be that stupid, but on the other hand how else do you explain it? And are they still making the Hungry Hungry Hippos movie?

 

Thank you. And regarding kids, I've had the same experience with my 4- and 10-year-old nephews. They just aren't into toys the way my brother and I were. Those of us who grew up in the 80s (and early 90s, I guess) lived in a glorious toy age driven by 30-minute commercials we called cartoons. How many toy cartoons are there now compared to back in the day?

Hasbro is suffering a culture shift (+ the double whammy of the economic crisis), and it's always funny that whenever news like this get released, immediately, people revert to a myopic adult-fanboy perspective and say, "Wah, wah, it's because you made a million toys I didn't want," or "Well, you should release better toys." Like we adult-collectors really factor that much into the costs of a company like Hasbro, compared to things like rising material costs, rising fuel costs, and a shrinking kid base. Some of you need to get over yourselves.

 

This is not major news, many companies have been taking a hit due to economic declines. Hasbro produces many toylines of which TF is just one. During tough economic times, the first thing to be cut back on is luxuries like toys and games.

That and we're in a world that is increasingly becoming more tuned to digital goods. For those of us who look forward to receiving a hunk of plastic in the mail - we're a rare breed nowadays.

But it figures like Beast Hunters Voyager Prime are indicative of their cost cutting strategy then I'm cool with that, despite being no doubt cheaper it doesn't feel cheap. I'm also not concerned about FOC size and cost cutting because most toy companies would put less effort into a video game sub-line of toys compared to their mainstream media based efforts e.g. TV shows and movies.

 

This is not major news, many companies have been taking a hit due to economic declines. Hasbro produces many toylines of which TF is just one. During tough economic times, the first thing to be cut back on is luxuries like toys and games.

That and we're in a world that is increasingly becoming more tuned to digital goods. For those of us who look forward to receiving a hunk of plastic in the mail - we're a rare breed nowadays.

But it figures like Beast Hunters Voyager Prime are indicative of their cost cutting strategy then I'm cool with that, despite being no doubt cheaper it doesn't feel cheap. I'm also not concerned about FOC size and cost cutting because most toy companies would put less effort into a video game sub-line of toys compared to their mainstream media based efforts e.g. TV shows and movies.

 

Hmmm... maybe they didn't make enough Bumblebees.

 

Maybe they will fire the monkey who transforms the toys before the photo shoots?